Mercury News

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Mar. 30, 2015  Scientists have long puzzled over the planet Mercury's excessively dark surface. New research suggests that carbon from passing comets could be the planet's mystery darkening ... full story

Mar. 23, 2015  Jupiter may have swept through the early solar system like a wrecking ball, destroying a first generation of inner planets before retreating into its current orbit, according to a new study. The ... full story

Mar. 19, 2015  MESSENGER will not go gentle into that good night. The mission will end sometime this spring, when the spacecraft runs out of propellant and the force of solar gravity causes it to impact the surface ... full story

Mar. 16, 2015  NASA's MESSENGER mission, now nearing the end of its fourth and final year of orbital operations at Mercury, is well into a low-altitude campaign that is returning images and measurements of the ... full story

Mar. 13, 2015  Scientists have created global-scale maps of Mercury's surface chemistry that reveal previously unrecognized geochemical terranes -- large regions that have compositions distinct from their ... full story

Dec. 16, 2014  The closest planet to the sun appears to get hit by a periodic meteor shower, possibly associated with a comet that produces multiple events annually on Earth. The clues pointing to Mercury's shower ... full story

Sep. 11, 2014  Blame the 'hot Jupiters.' These large, gaseous exoplanets can make their suns wobble when they wend their way through their own solar systems to snuggle up against their suns, according to new ... full story

July 30, 2014  Mercury's interior is different from the Earth's interior in a way that explains Mercury's bizarre magnetic field, planetary physicists report. Measurements from NASA's Messenger spacecraft have ... full story

July 9, 2014  Understanding the sun from afar isn't easy. NASA's MESSENGER spacecraft -- which orbits Mercury, and so is as close as 28 million miles from the sun versus Earth's 93 million miles -- is near enough ... full story

July 8, 2014  New simulations show that Mercury and other unusually metal-rich objects in the solar system may be relics left behind by hit-and-run collisions in the early solar system. The origin of planet ... full story

Featured Videos

Comet Orbiter Landing Team Gears Up to Touch-Down

AFP (Nov. 8, 2014)  More than a decade after the Rosetta Space Mission was launched, the comet orbiter will attempt to make history by launching a robotic lander called Philae onto a comet on November 12. Duration:00:55
Video provided by AFP

Soyuz Spacecraft Docks With Int'l Space Station

AP (May 29, 2014)  A Russian Soyuz spacecraft docked with the International Space Station on Thursday. The Soyuz carried three crew members, an American, a Russian and a German. (May 29)
Video provided by AP

All Mercury News

Mar. 30, 2015  Scientists have long puzzled over the planet Mercury's excessively dark surface. New research suggests that carbon from passing comets could be the planet's mystery darkening ... full story

Mar. 23, 2015  Jupiter may have swept through the early solar system like a wrecking ball, destroying a first generation of inner planets before retreating into its current orbit, according to a new study. The ... full story

Mar. 19, 2015  MESSENGER will not go gentle into that good night. The mission will end sometime this spring, when the spacecraft runs out of propellant and the force of solar gravity causes it to impact the surface ... full story

Mar. 16, 2015  NASA's MESSENGER mission, now nearing the end of its fourth and final year of orbital operations at Mercury, is well into a low-altitude campaign that is returning images and measurements of the ... full story

Mar. 13, 2015  Scientists have created global-scale maps of Mercury's surface chemistry that reveal previously unrecognized geochemical terranes -- large regions that have compositions distinct from their ... full story

Dec. 16, 2014  The closest planet to the sun appears to get hit by a periodic meteor shower, possibly associated with a comet that produces multiple events annually on Earth. The clues pointing to Mercury's ... full story

Nov. 6, 2014  Several organizations are eligible to name one of 20 to 30 planets, and their host stars, in a unique competition organized by the International Astronomical Union (IAU). The scheme gives members of ... full story

Sep. 11, 2014  Blame the 'hot Jupiters.' These large, gaseous exoplanets can make their suns wobble when they wend their way through their own solar systems to snuggle up against their suns, according to ... full story

July 30, 2014  Mercury's interior is different from the Earth's interior in a way that explains Mercury's bizarre magnetic field, planetary physicists report. Measurements from NASA's Messenger ... full story

July 9, 2014  Understanding the sun from afar isn't easy. NASA's MESSENGER spacecraft -- which orbits Mercury, and so is as close as 28 million miles from the sun versus Earth's 93 million miles -- ... full story

July 8, 2014  New simulations show that Mercury and other unusually metal-rich objects in the solar system may be relics left behind by hit-and-run collisions in the early solar system. The origin of planet ... full story

June 2, 2014  Two worlds orbiting a distant star are about to become a snack of cosmic proportions. Astronomers announced that the planets Kepler-56b and Kepler-56c will be swallowed by their star in a short time ... full story

Apr. 2, 2014  The surface of Mercury crackled with volcanic explosions for extended periods of the planet's history, according to a new analysis. The findings are surprising considering Mercury wasn't ... full story

Mar. 16, 2014  New global imaging and topographic data from MESSENGER show that the innermost planet has contracted far more than previous estimates. The results are based on a global study of more than 5,900 ... full story

July 22, 2013  Color and black-and-white images of Earth taken by two NASA interplanetary spacecraft on July 19 show our planet and its moon as bright beacons from millions of miles away in space. NASA's ... full story

July 10, 2013  The first American man in space had no place "to go," and urinating in space was a tough problem for engineers to solve. A new article discusses the considerations necessary to accommodate ... full story

July 5, 2013  Astronomers have studied the surface of Mercury to better understand if the plains were formed by volcanic flows or composed of material ejected from the planet's giant impact ... full story

July 2, 2013  The International Astronomical Union has officially recognized the names Kerberos and Styx for the fourth and fifth moons of Pluto respectively (formerly known as P4 and P5). These names were backed ... full story

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